“I’d Found Humanity Again” : The Casey McWhorter Tapes (4): Scheduled for Execution on November 16, 2023 in Alabama

“I’d Found Humanity Again” : The Casey McWhorter Tapes (4): Scheduled for Execution on November 16, 2023 in Alabama

I know this path very well.  Despair is something that I’ve grown quite intimate with.  I’ve caused it.  I’ve experienced it.  I’ve lived it.

Despair seems like too nice of a word to describe the feelings that I felt around the murder.  I was in despair when I realized what I’d done.  I was in despair when the door slammed behind me.  I was in despair when I realized they were going to try to kill me.  I guess I could go on forever down the line…but I think you get the point.  I’ve known despair.

When you get a death sentence, you have a monumental time with the dehumanization of it all.  Think about it.  You basically have a group of people saying that you are so worthless that you need to be killed.  I’m surprised I didn’t end it all right then and there.  Despair is when your own life is taken from you before you are even dead.

When I got to death row, I was barely 19.  I was in despair thinking that I’d be around a bunch of monsters.  The worst of the worst.  Then, I went to a deeper level of despair when I realized that I was one of them.  I stayed in that place for a long time.

Despair seemed to be my home…my reality…for several years.  Slowly, things began to change.  Eventually, I was able to rehumanize myself as I began to humanize those around me.

Cancer took my grandmother from me really slowly.  We’d always been close.  I knew she was going to die…but it didn’t make it any easier when I found out that she did.  I was in my cell weeping.  One of the other guys asked me what’s wrong.  For the next little bit, he sat with me as I processed things…and prayed with me.  I was in complete despair…but even amidst the despair of losing my grandmother…I realized that I’d found humanity again.

Now, I just try to cling to that peace that I felt back then.